[lg policy] Talking Policy: Yonatan Mendel on Israeli Identity

Sat Oct 15 15:05:17 UTC 2016

 Talking Policy: Yonatan Mendel on Israeli Identity
<http://www.worldpolicy.org/blog/2016/10/14/talking-policy-yonatan-mendel-israeli-identity>
October 14, 2016 - 12:00pm | admin
<http://www.worldpolicy.org/sites/default/files/node_img/19824242285_1ee9e7fb33_b.jpg>

To fully understand Israeli identity, the relationship between Israeli and
Arab-Palestinian cultures during the creation of the Israeli state must be
taken into account. Yonatan Mendel’s new book*, From the Arab Other to the
Israeli Self: Palestinian Culture in the Making of Israeli National
Identity
<https://www.routledge.com/From-the-Arab-Other-to-the-Israeli-Self-Palestinian-Culture-in-the-Making/Mendel-Ranta/p/book/9781472449351>*
,
<https://www.routledge.com/From-the-Arab-Other-to-the-Israeli-Self-Palestinian-Culture-in-the-Making/Mendel-Ranta/p/book/9781472449351>
co-authored
with Ronald Ranta of Kingston University, examines the dynamics between
these two cultures and what it means to be a “local” in your own home. *World
Policy Journal* spoke with Mendel to discuss the prominent effect of the
Arab “other” on modern day Israeli identity, the role of cultural identity
in foreign policy, and how the desire to belong in one’s own nation can
mold cultural perceptions and practices.

*WORLD POLICY JOURNAL*: Your book *From the Arab Other to the Israeli Self*
dissects the notion of “Israeliness” by creating an overarching
inter-cultural analysis of Israeli cultural productions and their Arab
origins. Why has the framework of cultural adoption through erasure been
the central element in the creation of what you describe as an illusion of
Israeli identity?

*YONATAN MENDEL*: We both identify two important patterns in the book. One
is that what many Jewish Europeans, who came to the country at the end of
the 19th century and beginning of the 20th century, wanted the most was to
become local—meaning to be not diasporic, and the people who were most
local in the country were the Arab Palestinian people. The second part,
which will answer your question, was we found that not only the creation of
Israeli food and culture but the creation of a new language, the Israeli
language. There was an admiration or romanticization, in which they looked
down upon the local Palestinians but they also wanted to be local
themselves—this is why they adapted to and imitated them. There was a
feeling of, “If they are local then who are we? Are we foreigners?”

The Arab people had an ancient culture to preserve, but this ancient
culture is actually Israelis’, too. The Arabic language is actually our
people's language. The Arabic food is actually our biblical food. You
cannot have a nation-state culture while acknowledging that it is made from
your enemy's culture, which created part of divide.

We identify with food culture, folklore culture, music, language, and other
things. We think that these things that make our world original,
refreshing, or, some would say, unique, some would consider to do the
opposite. Other Israeliness, meaning other Arab Palestinian culture, was
real and that is not part of the Israeli self.

*WPJ*: You've done much of your research in the movement and status of
language and culture in Jewish Arab society. Can you talk about the role
that cultural identity plays in the construction of a nation's foreign
policy?

*YM*: We are looking mostly at the way that Israel imagines itself. My
research generally deals with the Arabic language, which is what I
contributed to the book. I try to evaluate how we see language today.
Jewish Israeli students usually say say that Arabic is the most difficult
language for them to study—more so than English and French. Both Hebrew and
Arabic are mixed languages. Their evolution reflects the Jewish Israeli
feeling that they are not very much part of the Arab world or culture. We
tried to show this in the book.

One example of how language is reflects power relations is the fact that
Israelis imagine Arabic to be so different. We can learn about the way
Israelis see themselves, Israeliness, and the Arab world. We can also see
how language shapes our perceptions—we could study, for example, Arabic, a
language that is very similar to Hebrew, and understand the people by
understanding Arabic. At the end of the 19th century and beginning of the
20th century, Arabic words were adapted in order to recreate and revive the
Hebrew language. What we know and what we don't know, what we remember and
what we want to forget, the similarities that we put at the forefront or
the similarities that we hide—the book explains a lot of this.

We look first at what we know, second at what we don't want to know, and
third at the vacuum of language that make us a nation. Viewing the Arabic
language as an “other” doesn't allow us to see that part of our identity as
part of our self, and prevents people from being exposed to the works
written in Arabic that reflect Jewish Israeli identity.

*WPJ*: You introduce the idea of Israeli Orientalism in what ways have you
seen the U.S. reject or buy into this idea when dealing with Israel?

*YM*: When we write about Israeli orientalism, first we have to connect it
to the general idea of orientalism. The general idea of orientalism goes
back to the work of Edward Said and the body of language that not only
shaped the East but also shaped the West, which means that by creating
binary differentiations between the East and the West, it’s also an
imagination of the East and a shaping of the West. Israel is quite an
interesting case, and we can learn quite a lot from it, because Israel at
the end of the day was created by both people of Ashkenazi descent mainly
from the West and of Sephardic descent mainly from the East. But the idea
of the Zionist culture, and the whole idea of the creation of the Jewish
state in Palestine, were at the of the day European ideas. A lot of the
ideas of those people who created the state were influenced by orientalist
thinking. They looked at the other, the Orient, and they romanticized it
and they exoticized it. They had to characterize these groups as something
that would be similar to themselves because they wanted to become local,
but they also had to be very, very different because they didn't want o be
Arab. I think that this can tell us quite a lot.

*WPJ*: Your book goes beyond most literature on this topic in terms of how
you expand your study of the formation of Israeli culture past the initial
immigration waves. How has this cultural formation evolved during the
digital age?

*YM*: Generally, regarding the movement of Israeli culture, that this idea
of the process or the problems that we identify in the book—imitation,
participation, adaptation, displacement, and identity—is not a linear one.
A good example would be the keffiyeh, the famous Arab dress worn by men,
which was considered in the 1930s and 1940s to be a local sign. You could
see Zionist Jews put the keffiyeh on their heads, including leaders like
former Prime Minister Shimon Peres, who just passed away. It was considered
something that was very, very local. Then you jump—or leapfrog—to 2016, and
you see one member of the Knesset criticizing an Arab member of the Knesset
for having the keffiyeh, and she considered it to be an act of provocation.
Which means that some of the symbols that were Arab and were adapted by
Jews, and were considered signs of localness by them, today have ceased to
be signs of localness at all. In other examples, such as the way some of
the words in Arabic were adopted by Hebrew, there is a complete denial. In
others, you sometimes see a better type of relationship.
It is not a straight line; sometimes, Arab culture is the opposite of
Israeli culture, and sometimes there will be complete denial, and they will
say there is no connection whatsoever between the Israeli and the Arab. In
some areas, there is an acknowledgement that there are Arab ingredients in
what we consider to be Israeli. If we highlight the connection and if we
are not willing to turn a blind eye to the creation of Israeli culture,
which is very much based on Eastern culture between Arab and Jews, one
would argue that it could be some kind of breakthrough, in which the Jews
would not see the Arabs as the ultimate other but as part of the self.
Maybe this can be the one way create something that would unite us.

http://www.worldpolicy.org/blog/2016/10/14/talking-policy-yonatan-mendel-israeli-identity
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